


Almost Home

by MirrorMystic



Series: Among Eagles [5]
Category: Original Work
Genre: Action/Adventure, Developing Relationship, F/F, Gen, Multi, Space Opera, Urban Fantasy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-16
Updated: 2018-08-16
Packaged: 2019-06-28 12:00:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,032
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15706803
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MirrorMystic/pseuds/MirrorMystic
Summary: The assault on Site 17 was a success- and it was only the first of many. Using the information datamined from Site 17’s archives, the Order executed a coordinated strike against dozens of Syndicate holdings across the sector, with the crew of the Sparrow leading the charge.The Dark Star Syndicate is swiftly becoming a thing of the past. To celebrate their victory, the crew of the Sparrow takes some time off- in Trance City, Hypnos, where it all began.While Kit isn’t exactly thrilled to be back in her hometown, she, Aabha and Lily are ready to enjoy their little break. But there’s no rest for the wicked, nor those who hunt them- and the crew’s newest mission hits too close to home...





	Almost Home

**Author's Note:**

> Life has a way of sneaking up on you. I started this draft almost a whole month ago, and proceeded to get distracted by other projects. But I'm here, and I'm back, and I'm thrilled to be writing the Sparrow crew again. I hope you all enjoy the read!

~*~  
  
Aboard the Sparrow, sparks were flying.  
  
Figuratively, as in the competitive thrill that surged through Kit’s veins and drew her lips into a daring grin. And, more literally, in the clash of the electrified training rods against one another, filling the cargo bay with an eerie blue glow. Syl forced her back with a disdainful shove, Kit scrambling to keep her feet.  
  
“Enthusiasm is no substitute for patience and discipline,” Syl lectured, stony-faced. “Keep jumping at me like that, and it’ll kill you someday.”  
  
“Them’s fightin’ words, Chief!” Kit called. “You think you’re so cool, standing there and fighting with one hand behind your back?”  
  
“Mind, that hand normally holds a shield,” Syl said dryly. “But I thought you should stand at least a _chance_ of hitting me.”  
  
“Hit this, sister!” Kit cried out, diving forward in a lunge. Syl sidestepped the blow without even troubling to knock aside Kit’s aim, thwapping her baton into her stomach and then across her shoulders as she fell to her knees on the mat. Kit yelped in dismay.  
  
“Touch,” Syl said, deadpan, as Kit grumbled, shaking some feeling back into her arms. She caught a glimpse of their audience perched on the balcony, and flashed Syl a sheepish smile.  
  
“Come on, Chief, can’t you go easy on me?” Kit pleaded. “Girls are watching.”  
  
“You can do it, Kitty!” Aabha cheered.  
  
“Kick her ass, Chief!” Lily jeered.  
  
“Remind me why I do anything with you guys?” Kit called out. She took another running jump and laid into Syl with a flurry of blows, the cargo bay exploding with light, color, and sizzling electricity. Kit’s technique seemed to be “enthusiasm can substitute for skill as long as you yell loud enough”- and it was almost working, Syl catching her baton in a ringing block that she was forced to brace with two hands.  
  
Kit’s lips curled into a self-satisfied grin. But then the intercom pinged above them, and everyone reflexively glanced up.  
  
_“Attention, everybody. This is your captain speaking. We’re about to enter atmo, so everybody hold onto somethin’.”_  
  
Syl swung her training baton to the side as if flicking blood from the blade, deactivated its power field, and slid it back into its sheath.  
  
“Time’s up,” Syl announced. “You’re getting better. But ‘better’ isn’t ‘good’. Not yet, at least. But, in fairness, I have been doing this a lot longer than you have.”  
  
“Yeah, how old are you, anyway?” Kit wondered.  
  
“I was a soldier long before you were a twinkle in your parents’ eyes,” Syl intoned, somber.  
  
Kit blinked. “Whoa. Really?”  
  
“No,” Syl said flatly. “But it’s still rude to ask a lady her age. Better luck next time, Kit.”  
  
“Aww, come on…” Kit pouted. “How about we call that a draw?”  
  
“Is it really a draw if you fall on your ass?” Lily called from the cheap seats.  
  
“Bite me, you lil’ shit,” Kit said sweetly. Lily blew her a kiss.  
  
“Catch me, Kit!” Aabha cried. She took a running jump off the balcony rail, gown flying behind her like wings of crimson and gold. Ribbons of magicked wind curled around her form and softened her fall into Kit’s arms. She still eagerly dove into Kit’s embrace, Kit laughing as she spun her around.  
  
“Well, _I_ think she did great,” Aabha said proudly. Kit squirmed, embarrassed, unable to force the dopey smile from her lips. Aabha tipped her chin up, and their eyes met for a long moment, warm amber and dusky red…  
  
_“Brace for reentry, everyone!”_ Yuna chirped over the intercom.  
  
Aabha and Kit blinked, distracted. The Sparrow lurched with a bang. Aabha and Kit bonked their foreheads together and toppled onto the floor of the cargo deck. They lay there while Syl and Lily shook their heads with the utmost fondness. The ship rattled beneath them, but they stayed there, tangled in each others’ arms, and Aabha and Kit laughed and laughed.  
  
~*~  
  
The Sparrow fell like a comet across Hypnos’ night sky, still smouldering and aglow with the heat of re-entry. From this high up, they could see the network of mega-cities dotting Hypnos’ surface; islands of shining blue linked together by raised highways and magrails, a luminescent pattern rising from the landscape like constellations fallen to earth.  
  
The Sparrow made a beeline for one such city, protected from Hypnos’ boiling days, freezing nights, and weekly sandstorms by a carefully climate-controlled force field. There was a brief judder as they passed through the field, and then they were back under the blue-tinged skies of Trance City, where their investigation into the Blood Pact sorcerer, Father Cyrus, had led the team so long ago.  
  
Now, however, the Sparrow was not here for business. It had been a full month since their mission to Whitefall and the assault on Site 17. The crew of the Sparrow had spearheaded a series of coordinated strikes against Syndicate holdings throughout the sector, and now, The Order had the Dark Star Syndicate on the ropes. With a string of Syndicate raids under their belts, Commander Vega decided some R &R was in order, and had sent the crew to Hypnos to enjoy some well-earned time off.  
  
Granted, Hypnos was a desert planet, and, aside from cloudless nights granting a stunning view of the stars, the desert didn’t hold much appeal for tourists. But Trance City’s nightlife was famous across the sector, and the crew had plans- big plans- for their time ashore.  
  
Morgan took a deep breath and sighed, drumming his fingers against the countertop. He was staring at the vanity above his desk, trying to decide on what look he’d wear for his night out on the town. A stranger gazed at him from his mirror- pale and alien, with dark, sunken eyes and flesh like the bark of a tree.  
  
There came a knock. “Morgan?”  
  
“Come in!” he called. “I’m just putting on my face!”  
  
Morgan raised a hand and passed it over his face, his glamour shimmering to life and settling over him like a second skin. He gazed, satisfied, into his own familiar vivid green eyes, before glancing up at his hair. Morgan flicked his fingers, conjuring a single stray curl poking out of his tousled mop.  
  
“You know, some people call that ‘idiot hair’,” Syl said fondly, laying a hand on Morgan’s head. He shrugged her off, grinning.  
  
“I’ll have you know, that’s a good look,” Morgan said. “Young. Earnest. Non-threatening. It’s a good face to wear, whether we’re on the clock or not.”  
  
“Oh, yes, Morgan. And maybe on our next case, you’ll meet a nice, charming twink to go with your hair.”  
  
“One can only hope,” Morgan rolled his eyes. He glanced at Syl in his mirror, in a dark blazer over a forest green dress shirt, her arms folded across her chest. “What about you? Who are _you_ trying to impress?”  
  
Syl shrugged. “I’m just trying to look professional.”  
  
“You’re two, maybe three buttons away from stopping traffic,” Morgan teased.  
  
“I’ll take that as a compliment,” Syl muttered. Morgan smiled, but his eyes betrayed him, even through his glamour. “...What’s wrong?”  
  
“What? Nothing.”  
  
“Morgan.”  
  
Morgan’s smile faded. He sighed, fiddling with his collar.  
  
“...Aabha,” he said quietly. “She’s… doing well, isn’t she? She got hurt on Whitefall, but she was back on her feet right away… and the raids these past few weeks, hunting down Syndicate holdouts… she’s been a junior long enough, I think. I was considering talking to Commander Vega, filing for Aabha to have full Agent status.”  
  
Syl’s lips curled into the barest of frowns. She pulled up a chair and took a seat.  
  
“This is the first I’m hearing of this,” she said.  
  
“You don’t think she’s ready?”  
  
“I don’t think _you_ are,” Syl said gently. “When Aabha gets promoted, she’ll get her own team and we’ll be assigned another trainee. Are you really ready to have her leave the nest?”  
  
“Well, no, but… well, who says? Who says she has to leave? Maybe she can just take command of this team, and we can stick around in an advisory role.”  
  
Syl took a deep breath and sighed.  
  
“...I think…” Syl began, choosing her words carefully, “...we need to be mindful of having a more… professional… relationship with Aabha. As it is now, we’re… we’re too close. Too attached.”  
  
“I’m not too attached-”  
  
“You gave her your charm,” Syl cut in. She reached under her collar and pulled out her own- a vial of earth from a doomed planet. “You gave her your piece of Tir Tairngire. How is that not getting too attached?”  
  
“It’s mine to give to whom I will,” Morgan said, defensive. “And I gave it to her to keep her safe. That’s what we’re here to do. We’re responsible for her. She’s been on this ship for four years, Syl. She’s practically family!”  
  
“Aabha _has_ a family, Morgan,” Syl chided. “She has a home. She has a life waiting for her beyond this ship, beyond this crew, beyond this badge. She’s not like us.”  
  
Morgan blew out a sigh and sank into his chair. “Okay, okay. You’re right. As usual. Mostly.”  
  
“‘Mostly’?” Syl wondered.  
  
Morgan reached out, and found Syl’s hand. They twined their fingers together, and squeezed.  
  
“We _have_ a home,” Morgan said.  
  
“Yeah,” Syl breathed. She got up, and pulled Morgan up with her. “We’ll talk about this later. Now come on. Everybody’s waiting.”  
  
~*~  
  
The cargo bay was abuzz with activity, the crew chattering excitedly about their plans for their time ashore. The twins emerged from the crew deck and onto the balcony, where they could see Shanti already getting a head start on her plans for the night.  
  
The armory had been emptied, the lockers’ contents laid out on the cargo bay floor. Shanti pressed a control stud on the panel around her wrist, and a floor panel rose up on a hydraulic hoist, forming a makeshift workbench. Shanti pulled up a toolbox and folding chair and got right to work, mercifully deaf to Vincent’s indignant whining.  
  
“What do you _mean_ , you can’t come?” Vincent groaned.  
  
Shanti read Vincent’s lips, made a face, and signed something curt before getting back to tinkering.  
  
“‘You have work to do’? Aww, come on!” Vincent pleaded. “We’ve been busting our asses for a month. Can’t you put down your toolbox for one night to come on a bender with us? Who am I supposed to go drinking with now? _Jaki?_ ”  
  
Jaki smiled. “Well, I’m afraid I’ve sworn off alcohol, child. You’ll just have to drink enough for the both of us.”  
  
Shanti signed something, too quick for Vincent to parse. Jaki chuckled.  
  
“Shanti says you need to drink enough for her, too,” Jaki said.  
  
“Great, now I’m getting three times as drunk,” Vincent rolled his eyes.  
  
“With the way Shanti drinks? Try four.”  
  
“Okay, am _I_ the one paying for all this?”  
  
“I’ll go.”  
  
Vincent looked up as Syl descended the balcony steps, Morgan in tow. Vincent whistled appreciatively, before abruptly clearing his throat and adjusting his tie.  
  
“...Hey, Chief. You’re lookin’ sharp. Uh… maybe a little _too_ sharp to be hangin’ out with me, if you catch my drift.”  
  
“Problem, Mr. Capello?” Syl asked, bemused. “Are you the type to shrink away from competition?”  
  
Vincent made a face. “Could we maybe not phrase it like that?”  
  
“Sounds like y’all have a busy night ahead of you,” Robyn said. She hit a button on the door console and the cargo bay doors slid open with a pressurized hiss. “Y’all have fun, now.”  
  
“Won’t you join us, Captain?” Aabha asked.  
  
Robyn felt strong arms loop around her shoulders from behind and leaned back into Yuna’s chest, Yuna tucking Robyn’s head under her chin.  
  
“The Captain and I are going to have a night in,” Yuna said sweetly.  
  
“Ooooh,” Aabha teased. “Sounds like fun!”  
  
“Oh, yes, we’re gonna have lots of fun taking _inventory_ …” Robyn laughed. She nodded towards Shanti, meticulously working her way through the Sparrow’s impressive collection of arms and armor with a polishing cloth and a fine-tipped screwdriver. “At least we’ll have Shanti to keep us company while she’s busy keeping up the armory. You heroes have really been putting your gear through the wringer.”  
  
“Oh, and you haven’t?” Kit asked.  
  
“When _I_ get shot at, kiddo, it’s just a trip to the dry cleaner’s,” Robyn grinned, flipping up the collar on her signature ankle-length duster. “You girls have fun, alright?”  
  
Robyn and Yuna disappeared up the steps. They were ostensibly going to “do inventory”, but with the way Robyn’s arm curled around Yuna’s waist, Kit wouldn’t have been surprised if they were just shooing everyone out the door so they could have some alone time. And speaking of which…  
  
“Aww, Lily!” Aabha cooed. “You’re _sure_ you can’t come?”  
  
“Sorry, Aabha. I’ve got an important meeting tonight, and it just can’t wait,” Lily caught Kit’s eyes and smirked. “Next time, then?”  
  
“Next time,” Kit nodded.  
  
“That’s a shame…” Aabha mused, waving Lily goodbye as she stepped out into the spaceport, hands stuffed into the pockets of her dove-gray trenchcoat. Kit looped her arm around hers and squeezed, leaning her head against Aabha’s shoulder.  
  
“I was really hoping the three of us would get to see each other,” Aabha pouted.  
  
“You mean more than we normally do? We already live together,” Kit said.  
  
Aabha nudged an elbow into her side. “You know what I mean.”  
  
“Well, it looks like it’s just the two of us tonight,” Kit smiled slyly. “That’s not so bad, is it…?”  
  
Aabha shrugged. “Well, no, but…”  
  
Kit cleared her throat. Aabha turned, and saw the look in her eyes.  
  
“Hm?” Aabha blinked. Then she gasped, warmth flickering across her cheeks. “... _Oh._ ”  
  
“I know a place,” Kit all-but purred, squeezing Aabha’s arm. “Nice place. A little high-brow for a homeless street urchin such as myself, but you’re a genuine Order operative. Think you could get me in…?”  
  
Aabha made a face. “Well, that’s not very nice.”  
  
Kit paused. “What?”  
  
“Not being able to pay is one thing, but to turn you away just based on your looks…”  
  
“N-No, Aabha, it’s just- It’s just a turn of phrase, I don’t think they actually-”  
  
“Junior Puri?”  
  
Aabha went stiff. She dipped her head as Morgan approached, reluctantly pulling away from Kit and clasping her hands behind her back.  
  
“Senior Telerian,” Aabha said, carefully. “Have I done something wrong, sir?”  
  
Morgan blinked. “What?”  
  
“...Well… normally you just call me by my name, so-”  
  
“No, no,” Morgan waved the thought away. “There was just something I wished to discuss with you. Perhaps over dinner?”  
  
“Oh! Kit and I were just about to go to dinner!” Aabha saw the bleary look in Kit’s eyes and winced, but there was no turning back. “...If you would… care to… join us…”  
  
“I would love to,” Morgan said brightly, while Kit swallowed the knot of disappointment in her throat and tried her level best not to choke on it. “How does it feel to be back in your old stomping grounds, Junior Sato? Surely, you must know the best place to eat here in Trance City.”  
  
Aabha and Kit exchanged glances, Aabha smiling, apologetic. Kit heaved out a sigh.  
  
“...Oh yeah,” Kit muttered. “I know just the place…”  
  
~*~  
  
At first glance, Hypnos and Persephone could not be more different if they tried. For one thing, Persephone was tidally locked, with one hot side and one cold side, the clashing temperatures shrouding the habitable strip in between in near-constant rain. Hypnos, meanwhile, was a desert planet, with freezing nights and scorching days. Shielded mega-cities dotted its surface like oases, little bubbles of climate-controlled relief against the extremes of temperature beyond the barriers.  
  
Another difference was the sky. The sun never shone on Persephone- it was always cloudy, dreary, save for the occasional flashes of aurorae. During daytime on Hypnos, the sun never _stopped_ shining. Anyone who ventured beyond the protection of a shielded city risked going blind from the radiant glare off the brilliant white sand-- if they didn’t get cooked alive first.  
  
Hypnos and Persephone were worlds apart, figuratively, as well as literally. But as Lily slipped through the late night crowd, neon lights in the air, club music shaking the pavement beneath her feet, she couldn’t help feeling like this was strangely familiar.  
  
On Persephone, rain clouds blocked out the stars. The only lights were those humanity made for themselves: the neon beacons of entertainers and media moguls, the shining towers of corporate kings. Here on Hypnos, it was much the same. The stark, cloudless sky would be perfect for stargazing, if the lights of the city didn’t block them out. Whether here, or on Persephone, no one could see the stars.  
  
In the shadows, every city looks the same.  
  
Lily walked the streets of Trance City, just one among hundreds, the collar of her dove-gray trenchcoat turned up against the chill. A breeze shivered the corkscrews of her hair, and she darted into an alley- just another pedestrian ducking out of the wind, nothing to see here.  
  
She wasn’t alone. Shining green eyes glinted in the darkness of the alley. Lily tensed, her fists clenching in her coat pockets, only to see that it was just a black cat, perched on a dumpster.  
  
Lily exhaled. She tugged her sleeve up, idly checking her chron.  
  
Then she caught the derringer that fell out of her sleeve and snapped her aim towards the shadow at the end of the alley.  
  
“Say it now and say it right,” Lily demanded.  
  
The figure took a step forward, silhouetted by the eerie red light of the bar sign across the way. Lily swallowed hard, tightening her grip on her pistol.  
  
Then, despite everything, the shadow… giggled.  
  
Lily stifled a snicker. A snicker became a snort. A snort became a smile- and then Lila burst down the alley and into her arms, and absolutely nothing else mattered anymore.  
  
Lila got a running start and pounced, Lily catching her and spinning her and holding her so tight she wasn’t sure she could ever let her go again. They laughed together, smiling brighter than Hypnos’ sun on the harsh, white sand. Lila buried her head in Lily’s chest and sighed, smearing tears into her chest.  
  
“...I missed you…” Lila breathed. She curled her fingers into the fabric of Lily’s coat, grinning. “God. Look at you, Lily. You’re really going for the film noir thing, huh? Were you really gonna shoot me if I didn’t say the password or whatever?”  
  
Lily chuckled, tucking Lila’s head under her chin. “Come on. I had to know you weren’t an impostor.”  
  
“Aww, don’t you trust me?” Lila teased.  
  
“More than anyone,” Lily grinned. She gave Lila a squeeze. “I love you.”  
  
Lila squeaked with wordless affection and bumped her head against Lily’s like a cat. They stood there for a long moment, holding each other, swaying.  
  
_Well, now. Isn’t this sweet._  
  
Lily drew Lila behind her, her pistol snapping up and aimed down the alley. But there was no one- just the cat, eyes glinting like emeralds in the dark.  
  
An ominous wind swept down the alley, shivering Lily’s hair. The cat dropped nimbly onto the pavement, trailing inky darkness like a bridal train. The shadows gathered together, stepped into the light and became a woman, in an impeccable suit, tie, and long, dark coat, nudging her glasses up her nose to frame her piercing, glass-green eyes.  
  
Lily’s aim wavered, while Lila’s eyes practically rolled out of her skull.  
  
“Agent Crane,” Lily murmured, palming her pistol.  
  
“Miss Chase,” Crane nodded.  
  
“ _Tabby~!_ ” Lila whined. “We were having a _moment!_ ”  
  
“For the record, I was against having this meeting in person,” Crane said, curt, but not unkind. She met Lily’s eyes. “Lilian. I have news concerning the Dark Star Syndicate, and the two most wanted women in the sector shouldn’t be lingering here, in the public eye, however touching their reunion may be.”  
  
Lila stuck out her tongue. Crane almost smiled. Almost.  
  
“Come,” she said, beckoning them down the alley.  
  
“Where are we going?” Lily wondered.  
  
“Somewhere out of sight,” Crane urged. “Come. We have much to discuss.”  
  
~*~  
  
Back on the Sparrow, Robyn flopped down onto her bed with a grunt, a dataslate clutched to her stomach. She pulled off her signature rose glasses and rubbed at her eyes, her surgical scars chafing. She heaved a sigh, before propping up the dataslate on her chest and skimming through.  
  
“Work, work, work…” She muttered, flicking down the screen with her thumb. She felt a familiar weight settle behind her, and smiled, letting Yuna pull her head onto her lap.  
  
“My captain works so hard…” Yuna cooed, draping an arm around Robyn’s shoulders.  
  
“It’s all for you, sweetpea,” Robyn grinned. “Though I gotta say: Flying this thing is the best feeling in the world, but I don’t much care for all the housekeeping. Now that we’re docked, I gotta move rooms around… we gotta restock the kitchen, the armory, the engine room… shit, I gotta get Shanti a proper bed. I gave her old one to Lily, and now she’s crammed into a room with the other girls.”  
  
“Oh, I think she _likes_ having roommates,” Yuna chirped. “It’s just like at uni!”  
  
“Yeah, and just as crowded,” Robyn drawled. “For a spaceship, we sure don’t have a lot of space. Plus, Shanti needs a real bed. My chief engineer shouldn’t have to slum it on a hammock in the engine room. It’s bad enough I’ve kept her workshop this hurting for parts…”  
  
Yuna peeked at Robyn’s dataslate over her shoulder. Shanti’s requisition order was full of various parts and pieces that needed to be restocked in the engine room-- tools, materials, power cells. Add that to the list of basics, like fuel, groceries, and ammunition, and the Sparrow’s resupply order doubled in size. Tellingly, a good number of entries on Shanti’s list had been marked for “next time”. Either the spaceport hadn’t had them in stock, or the Sparrow just didn’t have the funds to spare at the time. Yuna wondered how long some of those entries had sat in Robyn’s supply order, leaving Shanti to improvise without them.  
  
Robyn heaved out another sigh, slumping into Yuna’s embrace. Yuna cooed, petting Robyn’s hair.  
  
“Hey, come on. We just need to do a little shopping, that’s all. It’ll be fun.”  
  
Robyn smiled, rueful. “Oh yeah, I’m gonna love braving those crowds…”  
  
Yuna smiled back. “Well. At least we have some peace and quiet tonight. We practically have the ship to ourselves.”  
  
“Well, I only have a huge list of chores to do. What better time for a nap?” Robyn grinned. She pulled her hat off of her nightstand and clapped it over her face, making a pillow of Yuna’s lap. “Oh, yeah. These are some real sleepy Robyn hours.”  
  
Yuna pulled Robyn’s hat off her face. Robyn blinked up at her, wondering.  
  
“Captain…” Yuna purred. “I _said_ , ‘we have the ship to ourselves…’”  
  
Robyn glanced down at Yuna walking her fingers down her collarbone and lingering near the top buttons of her shirt. She grinned up at her, playful.  
  
“Sweetpea, you gotta just say what you mean,” Robyn teased. “I’m kind of an idiot, don’tcha know.”  
  
~*~  
  
Across Trance City, Aabha and Kit were getting ready to enjoy a little private time of their own. Or they would have been, if not for Morgan.  
  
“Table for three, please,” Morgan said cheerfully, fiddling with his cuffs.  
  
The host acknowledged him with a glance over his notes and the barest of grunts.  
  
Morgan blinked. “Um… how long is the wait, may I ask?”  
  
“Thirty minutes,” the host muttered.  
  
Morgan glanced back to Aabha and Kit waiting behind him, already uncomfortably aware of his status as a third wheel. He cleared his throat, adjusting his badge pinned to his breast.  
  
“And, uh… how long is the wait for an esteemed Order operative?” Morgan tried.  
  
The host glowered at him.  
  
“Forty minutes,” he said.  
  
Morgan winced. “...Right.”  
  
Aabha and Kit were waiting further down the lobby, curled up together on a synthleather couch. As pouty as Kit had been when they first left the spaceport, she was finding it increasingly difficult to stay mad. It was Aabha, after all.  
  
“Let me ask you something,” Aabha said, squeezing Kit’s hand. She was blissfully warm. “I just want to be clear, because I’ve been told I’m, uh, a little clueless when it comes to things like this. But, um… is this a… date? Would you call this a date?”  
  
Kit smiled, despite everything. “Well, I would, if not for… y’know.”  
  
“I’m sorry,” Aabha murmured. “But… he’s my boss, y’know?”  
  
“I get it,” Kit nodded. “But I don’t think you act like he’s your boss. You kinda act like he’s your dad.”  
  
Aabha snorted. “He’s _not_ that old. He’s just-- I mean, I knew Morgan and Syl when I was still at the Academy, and I’ve worked with them ever since. Going on five years now. And, well, my parents--”  
  
Aabha stopped short. She frowned, staring down at her lap.  
  
“You never talk about your parents,” Kit observed.  
  
Aabha sighed. “It’s… complicated--”  
  
“I’m back,” Morgan announced, trudging back from the front desk in defeat. “Unfortunately, it seems like it’s very busy tonight.”  
  
“How’s the wait time?” Aabha asked, eager to change the subject.  
  
“Forty minutes,” Morgan said ruefully. “I considered charming the host, but, well, he said ‘it’ll be an hour if you try any Jedi mind trick shit’, so. I decided against that. I’m sorry to keep you all waiting.”  
  
Aabha glanced at Kit, squeezing her hand. Kit shrugged.  
  
“It’s whatever,” Kit said lightly. “Trust me, the food will be worth the wait.”  
  
~*~  
  
Lila slapped the cupboard shut with a huff.  
  
“Look at this!” she cried, dismayed. “What kind of pantry doesn’t even have canned tomatoes?”  
  
“A pantry inside a covert Order safehouse?” Lily offered dryly. She fondly watched Lila fuss around the kitchenette, her chin in her hand. “Lila, leave it alone. You don’t have to cook for me.”  
  
“Yes, I do,” Lila insisted. “You must be sick to death of shipboard food. When was the last time you had a proper meal?”  
  
“Ladies, if it’s all the same to you, might we get to business?” Crane wondered, nudging her glasses up her nose. She took a seat at the table, followed by Lily, tugging a reluctant Lila along by the hand.  
  
Crane slotted a data tile into her comm and set it on the table. It shimmered to life, projecting a luminous map of the sector.  
  
“Over the past month,” Crane began, “the Order launched a series of coordinated strikes against the Dark Star Syndicate. Thanks to your efforts, particularly the shipping information you obtained from Site 17, we knew exactly where to strike. Trafficking rings have been dismantled; holdouts, destroyed. I am proud to say that your father’s Syndicate is swiftly on its way to becoming a thing of the past-- and prouder, still, to know that you two were the architects of his downfall.”  
  
Lily clapped a hand on Lila’s shoulder. Lila’s smile was downright blinding.  
  
“That’s the good news,” Crane continued, stoic. “Unfortunately, such notoriety comes at a price, such as the hefty price the Dark Star Syndicate has put on your heads. If the Syndicate must fall, they seem determined to drag you down with them, if they can. It would be wise for you two to remain out of the public eye until this campaign has concluded.”  
  
“Aww, we’re not scared of any hitmen, are we, Lily?” Lila grinned.  
  
“Guys with guns, I can handle,” Lily said warily. “Personally, I’m more worried about the thing we uncovered at Site 17. The so-called ‘Project’.”  
  
“Ah, yes,” Crane muttered grimly.  
  
She touched the display, and it shifted to an array of blurry picts captured by Site 17’s security feed before the facility self-destructed. The phantom stared at them, a faceless, eerie, long-limbed creature cased in bronze armor and shrouded with a cloak of dark fabric that distorted its form into something smoke-like and insubstantial. And, though they hadn’t caught it on camera, Lily would never forget the sight of it chasing after the Sparrow even after its body had been destroyed-- a plume of black smoke lit from within by a hellish red light, an entity unlike anything Lily had ever seen.  
  
“That _is_ a concern,” Crane mused, tapping her chin. “Even moreso because Order Intelligence has failed to find any real information about what it was that attacked you. All we can say for certain is that the Blood Pact was involved. Anything more, you would have to ask the Syndicate officer in charge of Site 17: Underboss Charles Fontaine.”  
  
“Kit saw him running,” Lily nodded. “He must have been the one who set the facility to self-destruct on our way out.”  
  
“If anybody might have a lead on this so-called Project, it’s him,” Crane said. “He eluded the Order’s grasp back on Whitefall, but, as fate would have it, I have sources that have reported Charles Fontaine as being here on Hypnos at this very moment, in this very city.”  
  
Lily looked up sharply.  
  
"I highly doubt Fontaine was the mastermind behind the creation of such a terror,” Crane continued, “but if we take this opportunity to capture him--”  
  
“Shh!” Lily hissed. “Listen…”  
  
Crane stopped short, and glanced up at the ceiling. There was a distant, muffled creaking, like footsteps on floorboards. Lila’s eyes darted warily between her companions. Lily whispered, urgent, meeting Crane’s watchful gaze.  
  
“...Are you _sure_ this place is secure…?”  
  
~*~  
  
Robyn raised her arms above her head and stretched, letting out a satisfied sigh. She sauntered down the steps from her cabin, her list of chores momentarily forgotten. She whistled a merry tune, casually buttoning up her shirt, before poking her head into the kitchen and checking the fridge.  
  
Her comm chirped. She fished it out of her pocket and clicked on the holodisplay. A luminous wireframe model of the Sparrow shone up from her cupped palm. An alert had registered below her, on the cargo deck, but had disappeared just as quickly.  
  
Robyn frowned, but shrugged, pocketing her comm and rummaging through the fridge. She grumbled, swatting at the bare shelves.  
  
“Add ‘soda’ to the shopping list,” she muttered to herself.  
  
Her comm chirped again, insistent. Robyn checked it with a sigh. Another alert had registered from below, this time from the engine room.  
  
Robyn furrowed her brow, typing out a message.  
  
_Shanti, everything okay down there?_ she sent.  
  
Robyn pocketed her comm, stepped out of the kitchen--  
  
\--and found herself face to face with half a dozen gangsters, bearing laspistols, in white dress shirts, black vests, and signature crimson ties.  
  
Robyn huffed an irritated sigh and held her hands above her head.  
  
“Son of a bitch.”  
  
~*~  
  
Any reservations Kit might have had about having Morgan invite himself along to date night with Aabha mostly disappeared when Morgan agreed to pay the bill. Any lingering reservations abruptly vanished the instant their food arrived.  
  
Aabha smiled, watching with the utmost fondness as Kit plowed into a mountain of lasagna as big as her head. She nudged her knee under the table, and Kit looked up. Kit flashed Aabha a grin positively dripping with red sauce, and Aabha giggled with delight.  
  
“I’m glad to see you two are enjoying yourselves,” Morgan said, poking at his salad. “It wasn’t too long ago that we were here searching for Father Cyrus of the Blood Pact. That investigation didn’t end the way we thought it would, did it?”  
  
Aabha bumped her elbow against Kit’s, and grinned.  
  
“It’s been an interesting couple of months,” Aabha said.  
  
“Indeed.”  
  
“So, what was it that you needed to talk to me about?” Aabha wondered.  
  
Morgan faltered. He cleared his throat. “...Oh, uh. Right.”  
  
How did one go about telling your apprentice that your fondness for her was overstepping professional bounds? As Morgan wracked his brain for potential ways to broach the topic, or at least ways to put off this conversation for another day, it occurred to him that procrastination was hardly professional, either.  
  
“Aabha,” Morgan tentatively began, “did I ever tell you the story of Operation Whitefall?”  
  
“Hm?” Aabha leaned in, intrigued. “No, you haven’t.”  
  
“More of a legend, really,” Morgan said. “This took place a thousand years ago, before we discovered the planet Whitefall, before the Order itself. It’s a story of the proto-Order-- an organization called the ‘Sky Sanctuary’-- forcibly ending a civil war in Hell.”  
  
“In _Hell_ ?” Aabha wondered.  
  
“Oh, yes,” Morgan chuckled. “In Hell itself…”  
  
~*~  
  
Long ago, when the World was young...  
  
Lucifer, the Morning Star, fell into darkness.  
  
He fell through thought, and time; through space, and memory. Away from the light and warmth of the Celestial Plane, he fell... He fell for an eternity. And after an eternity of falling, he came to rest in a land of mist and shadows, far beneath Heaven. And, knowing that he would never again be permitted into the presence of the Almighty, that the gleaming spires of the Silver City would be forever beyond his reach, he let out a wail of grief and anguish that shook the foundations of the Earth long before there were any creatures upon it to hear him.  
  
But, though he was disgraced, he was not without power. Lucifer reached into that place of shapeless mist and shadows, and out of it, he pulled an empire. Through sheer force of will, he took the spot where he landed in the Unformed World and transformed it into what we know, today, as Hell. In the heart of his realm, he created his home, the Black Palace... and in the heart of his Palace, at the seat of his power, he created the Throne of Hell.  
  
Within this Throne, he infused a portion of his soul-- giving any who sit upon it the strength and will to wrest this chaotic plane into something approaching civilization.  
  
For a time, Lucifer ruled his domain with an iron fist. In that time, Hell... did not exactly prosper, but it survived, and functioned, with some semblance of normalcy...  
  
And for a time, it was good.  
  
But it could not last.  
  
Time passed, and Hell suffered. Lucifer's power waned, his influence diminished, until at last, weary of his duties of managing a realm of cruelty and brutality...  
  
Lucifer abandoned Hell, and his Throne, disappearing into the mortal plane with his consort, Lilith, the Red Queen.  
  
Rumors ran rampant after Lucifer's disappearance. Nobody knew if he left out of mere dereliction of duty, or if some awful, terrible power had forced him into hiding... and the thought of an entity that could force Lucifer from his place of power is a terrible thought, indeed. But, one way or another, Lucifer abandoned his Throne, and Hell dissolved into chaos.  
  
Hell splintered into city-states, each ruled by warlords: the Archdevils, progenitors of the demonic bloodlines and rivals in war. The Archdevils fought for control of the Black Palace, and the Throne of Hell that sat at its summit, in a conflict so catastrophically bloody that the Sky Sanctuary had no choice but to intervene.  
  
Operation Whitefall was the Sky Sanctuary’s mission to end the war in Hell, by force, in a single, decisive strike. Sanctuary agents descended upon Hell’s blasted plains, wreathed in white light and falling like snow.  
  
One by one, each and every one of the Archdevils was systematically assassinated.  
  
~*~  
  
“...And just like that, the war was over,” Morgan said. “The bloodlines were scattered, leaderless and in disarray. The Black Palace was secured, and all that was left was to decide what became of the Throne of Hell. The Sanctuary left the Black Palace in the control of the Angels, stewards of Hell, confident that they would shun the temptation to take Lucifer’s Throne and the immense power that came with it. The Sanctuary withdrew from Hell, leaving a token force within the Black Palace, and the Throne of Hell sat empty.”  
  
“So that’s… good, right?” Aabha said. “By assassinating the warmongers, you end the conflict in the most bloodless way feasible. The war is over.”  
  
“The war was over, yes,” Morgan said, “but there was no peace. Even the best of us can be undone by a desire for power. New Archdevils arose to unite their scattered clans. The Angels posted in Hell were overthrown. A new civil war erupted. The Sanctuary failed every successive attempt to end the ceaseless violence, and the Black Palace remains contested to this day.”  
  
Kit looked up sharply, bumping an elbow against Aabha’s. She lifted her head, following Kit’s gaze.  
  
“As long as power exists, there will be those who covet it, those who are corrupted by it, and those who rise to claim it after the previous wielders fall from grace,” Morgan intoned. He narrowed his eyes at the front desk, where a dozen sharply dressed men in three-piece suits and crimson ties were speaking to the host, who turned, and pointed to their table.  
  
Morgan got up, ushering Aabha and Kit away.  
  
“If there’s a lesson to be learned from that story, it’s this,” Morgan said. “The Devil’s Throne never stays empty for long.”  
  
~*~  
  
The door exploded.  
  
A masked trooper hit the ground with a crunch. Automatic gunfire tore into the safehouse over his fallen form, shredding the couch and punching through the cupboards, stippling the far wall with harsh, sooty laser burns.  
  
A brief pause. Then a trooper stepped over his fallen comrade and ventured into the cloud of dust and grit kicked up by the barrage--  
  
\--and saw a shadow disappear out the window.  
  
He rushed over, peering down to the street below, before looking up, at the silhouettes climbing up the fire escape and darting over the edge.  
  
“The roof!” he cried. “They’re going for the roof!”  
  
Something bonked against his helmet. He turned, saw something spinning over his shoulder.  
  
The trooper vanished in a wall of fire. He thrashed and flailed, burning, before his corpse hit the rickety metal deck of the fire escape and the half-molten scaffold fell from the wall with a shriek of metal.  
  
Up above, Crane didn’t have time to relish the satisfaction of a well-thrown grenade. She could already hear the clanking of boots up the rooftop access stairway. She drew her sidearm, and toggled off the safety.  
  
A masked trooper burst through the door. Crane shot him, a perfect shot right through his faceplate, before being forced down under a barrage of automatic fire. She scrambled down behind a ventilator unit, Lily cradling Lila in her arms.  
  
“You wouldn’t happen to have any more explosives, would you?” Lily asked lightly, checking the load in her derringer.  
  
“No,” Crane said flatly. “I’m a spy, not a soldier. Typically, if I have to fight, I’ve already lost.”  
  
“Well, aren’t _you_ a bundle of joy,” Lily muttered.  
  
“I’m so sorry, Lily,” Lila babbled, frantic, clutching the fabric of Lily’s dove-gray coat. “We could’ve had this whole meeting over holo and none of this would’ve happened, but I just missed you so much, I _needed_ to see you in person--”  
  
“Shh,” Lily cooed. “It’s going to be okay.”  
  
Lily reached up, snapped off a few shots, before dropping back into cover with a yelp. She glanced up at Crane.  
  
“It’s going to be okay, _right_?”  
  
Crane glanced down, tapping at her comm. She frowned, shaking her head.  
  
“I tried calling for support, but they’re jamming us. A strange amount of tech and firepower for an ordinary gang hit…” Crane scowled. She pressed her back against the ventilator unit, listening for the distinct sound of each weapon’s discharge, counting. “At least four shooters. Alright. I’ll be back.”  
  
“Where could you possibly be going?” Lily hissed.  
  
Crane exhaled, and melted into smoke. She re-emerged from the shadows as a black cat, slinking along the outskirts of the roof, circling around the hail of gunfire denting and buckling the ventilator unit Lily and Lila were sheltering behind.  
  
She saw them, in position around the top of the stairs. Four men, two just inside the door, two crouching in front. She gritted her teeth.  
  
Crane leapt, wreathed in black smoke. She emerged from cat form with her pistol drawn. She fired two shots, hooked her elbow around a throat and rolled into a crouch, snapping a man’s neck as she rose. She raised her aim, dropped a third trooper with two to the chest.  
  
A boot cracked into her knuckles and jarred her pistol from her grip, sending it skittering across the roof. The last trooper raised their rifle to their shoulder, took aim--  
  
\--and died, with a sword through his chest.  
  
The man crumpled, and Syl emerged from the stairwell, wiping her blade on her pants.  
  
“You rang?” Syl asked dryly.  
  
“Syl,” Crane breathed in gratitude. She took Syl’s offered hand and got to her feet, Lily and Lila warily poking their heads out of cover a short distance away. “Did you get my signal?”  
  
Syl shook her head. “No. Just had a feeling.”  
  
Lila saw Syl across the roof and waved. Syl smiled, and awkwardly waved back.  
  
“Come on,” Syl urged. “We need to get back to the Sparrow.”  
  
~*~  
  
In the night, three phantoms slipped across the rapidly darkening streets. Trance City’s nightlife was bursting into bloom and bathing the world in sinister red neon, while the evening crowd rapidly thinned, until it was just Aabha, Kit, Morgan, and the sharply-dressed men slowly but surely closing in.  
  
The trio ducked behind a low stone wall, watching the shadows flitting past. Kit heaved a sigh, patting her stomach.  
  
“Hey, Aabha. Remember when we started a bar fight with Syndicate thugs on Persephone, and we wound up fighting on an empty stomach?”  
  
“I remember when _you_ started a bar fight with Syndicate thugs on Persephone, and got us both detained by Planetary Defense afterward, yeah.”  
  
“...Okay, well. Turns out, fighting when I’m stuffed to the gills? Probably not great, either.”  
  
“I’ll keep it in mind…” Aabha teased.  
  
Morgan led them down an alleyway, bisected by a fence. Kit boosted Aabha and Morgan over on gusts of magicked wind, before following them over via her own climbing skill, landing in a crouch with a flourish. She glanced up, seeing the appreciative glint in Aabha’s eyes. Kit grinned.  
  
“Parkour,” she said.  
  
They turned another corner, Morgan grabbing Kit by the hand and yanking her back down just as a well-dressed patrol came by, flashlight beams stabbing through the dark.  
  
“Damn…” Kit muttered. “Trance City’s always had three big gangs vying for control; the Syndicate, the Exchange, and the Blood Pact. I took us to a restaurant on Exchange turf hoping the Syndicate would stay away, but now…”  
  
“They’re after Lily,” Aabha said with a grimace. “They must be. The price on her head must be worth the cost of a manhunt like this.”  
  
“And here we are, stranded in the middle of contested gang territory,” Morgan muttered.  
  
Aabha frowned, and touched the orb in the center of her badge.  
  
Nothing happened. She tried again, and again.  
  
“Why…?” she wondered.  
  
“Either Shanti’s not done with maintenance yet, or the armory’s been compromised,” Morgan said darkly. “Either way, we’re on our own.”  
  
“We’ll get back to the Sparrow,” Aabha said, resolute. “We’ll find a way.”  
  
“Listen, Aabha, we gotta be careful about this, okay?” Kit pleaded. “You don’t know this city like I do. We’re on the very edge of Alliance space. Your badge won’t get you far with the scum that run these streets. Out here, the people with power are the people who have the guns to back it up.”  
  
“And, seeing as how we don’t have the guns…” Morgan trailed off.  
  
Aabha frowned, but said nothing. Morgan sighed, and urged them forward.  
  
“...Come on. Let’s keep moving.”  
  
They darted ahead, melting from shadow to shadow even as phantoms moved in their peripheral vision, recoiling from roving searchlights as if they’d been burned. They made it a few more blocks towards the spaceport when a chilling scream split the air. Aabha reflexively moved to respond-- when Kit grabbed her by the hand.  
  
“ _Wait_ , Aabha!” Kit hissed. “Don’t go running off. Remember what I just told you? Your badge _won’t_ protect you out there!”  
  
There was another wet impact, and a scream that devolved into sobs. Aabha grit her teeth.  
  
“It can protect _him_ ,” Aabha insisted, taking off at a run.  
  
She emerged onto an alley down the block, where she found a quartet of Syndicate thugs standing over a young man with a black eye, clutching a mangled arm.  
  
“Where is she?” a gangster demanded, pointedly slapping a length of pipe into his palm. “We know you saw her, you little shit! Now tell us where she is, and we can _all_ get paid!”  
  
“I told you, that was weeks ago…!” the boy cried.  
  
“You just want that money all to yourself…!” the gangster roared, raising his pipe with both hands--  
  
“Hey!” Aabha snapped, marching forward. She glowered at the lead gangster, eyes glinting gold in the frail moonlight. “Pick on someone your own size!”  
  
The man took in Aabha’s willowy form, nearly his height but half his width. He scoffed.  
  
“What, like _you_?”  
  
He charged, pipe brandished over his head and ready to crush Aabha’s skull. Aabha raised a palm, and the pipe in his hands shone red-hot. He dropped his weapon with a pained squeal, and Aabha slapped him into the wall, the flames engulfing her fingers leaving a red scorch mark on his cheek.  
  
His three companions burst into action. Aabha bobbed and weaved around their incoming fists, hearing the telltale sound of familiar footsteps running up behind her.  
  
Aabha ducked, and Kit rolled across her shoulders, kicking a man in the face. Kit crunched a man’s face against the lid of a dumpster with a wind-assisted kick. A mobster grabbed for Aabha but Aabha caught him first, her hands around his wrists. He squealed in pain as Aabha’s fire blazed scorching trails up his forearms, before Aabha yanked him forward and smashed his sternum on her knee. The last mobster got his arm around Kit’s neck from behind, but Kit jumped up, braced her legs against the alley wall, and kicked. She slammed her attacker against the opposite wall in a gust of magicked wind. He fell to the ground, and was still.  
  
Aabha exhaled, and flipped her braid over her shoulder. She knelt by the boy, scarcely out of his teens.  
  
“Are you alright?” she asked, while Morgan examined his arm, his fingers shining with the soothing green of healing power.  
  
“Yes, I think s--” the boy hissed in pain as Morgan touched his broken arm. He looked up, meeting Aabha’s eyes.  
  
Aabha pulled the golden sash off her shoulder and helped Morgan ease the boy’s arm into a tight sling, tying it off around his neck. Aabha took the boy’s free hand and hoisted him to his feet.  
  
“What’s your name?” Aabha asked.  
  
The boy seemed reluctant to meet her eyes.  
  
“Er… Cooper, ma’am.”  
  
“Can you walk, Cooper?” Morgan asked.  
  
“Can you _run_?” Kit pressed.  
  
“Yes,” Cooper nodded, eyes darting between his three unexpected saviors. “Yes, I think so.”  
  
“Good,” Kit said, watching the crowd of Syndicate thugs slowly closing in. “Because we should _really_ be running...”  
  
They fled, through winding alleyways and shadowed streets, darting away from the beams of flashlights stabbing through the gloom. At every fork in the road, they turned down the path that didn’t have shadows lurking at the end-- but they were swiftly running out of options. Their pursuers were closing in.  
  
They stopped to catch their breath behind a dilapidated storefront. The dark roiled around them, full of hunting eyes. Kit growled.  
  
“Damn it,” she said. “If we keep going like this, we’re just going to wind up leading them back to the Sparrow.”  
  
“You can’t fight them,” Cooper said.  
  
“We can’t fight _all_ of them,” Morgan corrected. “We may not have our weapons and armor right now, but we are still three supers against mundane gunmen. And if we don’t do something now, they’ll just be on us all night.”  
  
“How many are on us, do you think?” Aabha wondered.  
  
“A dozen at least. Maybe two,” Kit said.  
  
“Okay,” Aabha said, resolute. “We’ll take them. We make our stand here, punch a hole and then run before they can fill the gap.”  
  
“You can’t be serious,” Cooper balked. “You’re gonna fight them? You’re unarmed!”  
  
“Well…” Aabha smiled, rings of fire forming between her fingers. “I wouldn’t say _that_.”  
  
Aabha and Kit met each other’s eyes and nodded, before setting off down the street, Morgan preparing their trap. He saw their lure immediately-- a windstorm, ignited by Aabha’s magic into a huge spiraling beacon of flame, racing above the rooftops and announcing their position to anyone and everyone who was still out on the streets.  
  
Aabha and Kit raced back around the corner, laughing like giddy schoolgirls despite the mob snapping at their heels. Aabha and Kit ducked a corner, the crowd following just a few steps behind--  
  
\--only to come face to face with a magic circle, painstakingly inscribed in the air.  
  
_“Lightning!”_  
  
The girls threw themselves aside as Morgan’s spell shattered the darkness, engulfing the mob of gangsters in waves of frothing, sizzling energy. They crumpled to the ground, weeping smoke, arcs of blue-white electricity crackling across their limbs.  
  
Cooper lifted his head from where he was cowering, and gasped, taking in the sight of two dozen armed gangsters sprawled unconscious on the pavement.  
  
“Holy shit,” he muttered.  
  
Aabha met Kit’s eyes and grinned. They slapped hands.  
  
Then a bolt of searing white lightning struck Aabha in the chest.  
  
Kit recoiled, crying Aabha’s name in alarm. Morgan heard the distinct whine of a phasic weapon charging another shot. Another bolt of bluish-white lightning stopped just short of spearing through Kit’s chest, dissipating across the shining blue barrier Morgan cast over the girls’ heads.  
  
Another shot, this one deeper, booming. A ghastly spray of blood exploded out of Morgan’s stomach and threw him to the ground..  
  
Morgan’s barrier vanished into ribbons of light. Another shot-- Kit summoned the wind by reflex, and a hard round meant for her chest lodged in her left bicep and spun her from torque. She hit the ground with a gasp.  
  
She saw Aabha, stunned and murmuring as if half-asleep. She saw Morgan, face down on the pavement and ominously still.  
  
Kit wreathed herself in magicked wind, barked out a curse, and pounced. She dove across the street, a phasic bolt missing her by inches. She grabbed Cooper with her good arm, drew the wind around them, and ran.  
  
~*~  
  
Robyn glowered at the Syndicate thug down the sights of his laspistol, watching as a pair of uniformed thugs marched Yuna down from their cabin, another pair jabbing gun barrels into Shanti’s shoulder blades as she trudged her way up from the cargo deck.  
  
Yuna was pouty and sulking about getting dragged out of bed, which was to be expected, but Shanti was stoic, unreadable. She was still in her engineering coveralls, an inert drone resting in a half-open hip pouch.  
  
Shanti met Robyn’s eyes. She gestured with her fingers.  
  
“Hey hey hey, what was that?” a guard snapped.  
  
“She’s _deaf_ , jackass,” Robyn shot back, giving Shanti the barest of nods.  
  
_On my signal_ , Shanti had signed.  
  
“Where is she?” one of the thugs demanded. Robyn felt the laspistol against the back of her head, and stifled a smile. Being held at gunpoint was not an appropriate time to crack up.  
  
“Could you, uh… be a little more specific…?”  
  
“Don’t play dumb with me, bitch!” the man growled. “You know these suits, you know these colors. We’re Syndicate, and _you_ …”  
  
The man circled around, his aim never wavering from Robyn’s face. Robyn’s eyes briefly flicked down to the green indicator light on the pistol grip above his thumb.  
  
“...you’ve been _very_ bad for business,” the thug finished. “Now where’s the girl?”  
  
“Which one?” Robyn asked sweetly. “I have so _many_!”  
  
The man roared in frustration. As if on cue, the lights aboard the Sparrow flickered and dimmed, before gradually returning to their normal brightness.  
  
He looked down. The indicator light on his pistol had gone from a steady green to a blinking yellow.  
  
_Rebooting._  
  
Robyn punched him in the jaw.  
  
A brawl erupted in the crew deck corridor. Robyn took off her hat and threw it at the nearest gunman. He caught it, by reflex, and proceeded to catch Robyn’s boot in his throat.  
  
Shanti flexed her fingers, and the drone in her hip pouch whirred to life. It zoomed out on its anti-grav thrusters and crunched into a man’s chest, cracking his sternum. It careened across the hall and broke a man’s shin. He cried out, stumbling, Shanti’s elbow smashing into his nose.  
  
Yuna’s slim fingers curled around two men’s gun arms and she casually snapped their wrists. She pulled them forward and cracked their heads together, before dropping them and their weapons to the deck. Another gunman leveled his pistol, frantically squeezing the unresponsive trigger. She slapped the gun from his hands and chopped him in the throat. A fourth thug came running at her from behind. She grabbed him by the arm and carried his momentum into an over-the-shoulder throw, slamming him onto the deck, the fight-- and all the air in his lungs-- leaving him in an instant.  
  
Robyn punched a man in the face, grabbed his tie as he reeled back, then pulled him in and punched him again. He crumpled in a heap alongside his compatriots, all of them moaning in pain and sprawled across the deck as if a bomb had gone off.  
  
“So… that was the signal, I take it?” Robyn asked, glancing at Shanti.  
  
Shanti’s drone transcribed the question for her in luminous yellow holotext. Shanti flexed her fingers inside her gloves, typing out her response.  
  
_Localized EM pulse,_ she said. _Strong enough for an emergency shutdown in the engine room… or for shorting out energy weapons._  
  
“You always have the fanciest toys,” Robyn said. She clapped a hand on Shanti’s shoulder and they shared a grin.  
  
Robyn turned her attention to the most conscious gangster of the lot. He was pulling himself to his feet, nursing an aching jaw.  
  
Robyn reached down amid the heap of battered bodies and retrieved her hat, setting it squarely on her head. Yuna stood at her side, glowering down at the gangster at their feet.  
  
“This crew is my family,” Yuna said with a cold fury. “This ship, my home.”  
  
“And we don’t much care for mafia errand boys bursting into our home,” Robyn said, crossing her arms. “Somebody needs to be taught some manners, I think. So. Who sent you?”  
  
The man laughed, bitter. “You think you can protect her?”  
  
“What, from people like you?” Robyn shrugged. “It’s not like it’s hard. Who sent you?”  
  
“Fuck you,” he spat.  
  
“I will thank you to watch your tongue in this house,” Yuna said, and laid him out on the deck.  
  
~*~  
  
Yuna dragged the last Syndicate thug down the Sparrow’s boarding ramp and unceremoniously dropped him in a pile with all the others. They would wake up in a couple of hours, in the custody of spaceport officials, mysteriously missing their guns, holocomms, and credsticks. Until then, they were free to sleep off their beatings in a pile in the corner of the hangar.  
  
“What on Earth?” came a voice. “What happened to you?”  
  
Jaki sauntered into the hangar, Vincent draped over his shoulder with a killer headache and a fresh black eye. Robyn looked up from where she and Shanti were quietly looking through their spoils, narrowing her eyes at the duo.  
  
“What happened to us? What happened to _you_? Did Syndicate goons do that to you?”  
  
“An angry drunk did that to him,” Jaki sniffed. “The goons came after. I… dealt with them.”  
  
“I’m sorry I wasn’t much help,” Vincent slurred.  
  
“Sleep it off,” Robyn chided.  
  
There was a shout across the hangar. Robyn turned, raising an eyebrow.  
  
“Shut up!” Lila squealed. “ _That’s_ the Sparrow? It’s so _cool_!”  
  
Lily grinned, and bumped an elbow against hers. “I’ll have to give you the tour…”  
  
Syl didn’t share the Chase sisters’ good humor. She marched right up to Robyn, stony-faced, Agent Crane in tow.  
  
“What, did you just wear your sword along with your casual clothes?” Robyn wondered, grinning. “It’s a good look.”  
  
Syl wasn’t smiling. “Where’s my brother? Where’s Aabha and Kit?”  
  
“They’re not back yet,” Robyn said.  
  
“They’d better get back soon,” Crane said grimly. “This city is a hornet’s nest.”  
  
“So I noticed,” Robyn muttered. “Alright, once we get everyone accounted for, we’re taking off. We’ll find a better place to spend our shore leave. You coming with us, Tabby?”  
  
“We’ll see,” Crane said. “First, I’ll have to submit my report--”  
  
Lily’s comm chirped. She fished it out of her pocket.  
  
“Oh, guys! It’s Kit!” She called out, putting it on speaker. “Hey, Kit?”  
  
_“Hello?”_ came an unfamiliar voice. _“Are you with the Order?”_  
  
Syl snatched the comm out of Lily’s hands.  
  
“Who is this?” she demanded. “How did you get this frequency?”  
  
_“Please…”_ Cooper begged. _“You have to help. They took them. The Exchange took them.”_  
  
~*~  
  
Shapes. Shadows. Red light…  
  
Aabha blearily blinked herself awake. Her heart was pounding, but her body felt like lead. She was slumped forward in a chair, her arms behind her back. She felt something against her foot.  
  
Aabha’s eyes snapped open.  
  
_Morgan!_ she wanted to cry, but her jaw was locked tight. She shuddered, her brain racing beyond her body’s ability to respond. Her head was spinning, her heart aching, but her body just wouldn’t move.  
  
“Don’t worry,” said a voice.  
  
Aabha went stiff. Morgan was laying on the deck, shirtless, his robe laid out under him like a sheet. There was a man crouching over him, dressed all in white-- but he was no priest, no doctor. He was a bounty hunter, a giant of a man in scuffed white armor, his suit only adding to his already formidable bulk. Next to him, Morgan was tiny-- a rag doll in his hands, and just as limp.  
  
“I didn’t kill him,” the man said, with a jovial grin. “Client says ‘alive’, I bag ‘em alive. Maybe not as alive as you’d like, but, well. Nothing personal. You understand.”  
  
The man lifted up a little glass vial. Something rattled around inside-- a cold iron slug, still wet with Morgan’s blood.  
  
“Nah, he won’t die,” the man said, insufferably cheerful. “But I couldn’t get the whole thing out. There’s still more than enough in his system to stop him from trying anything stupid. Nothing personal. You understand.”  
  
Morgan was sweating, feverish. He shivered and gasped, as if in the throes of a nightmare. There were bandages wrapped around Morgan’s midsection, soaked through with blood. But what really caught Aabha’s eyes were the patches of pale white creeping out from beneath the gauze, spreading from the wound-- eerie, alien, like the bark of a tree.  
  
Aabha wanted to demand “who”, but “who” was obvious: a bounty hunter. Someone after Lily, using them as stepping stones, bargaining chips. But Aabha lifted her head and glared at her captor, fighting the muscles in her throat to force out her question.  
  
“Where…?” Aabha choked out. The bounty hunter smiled.  
  
“A train,” he answered. “So buckle up, little missy. It’s going to be a long ride.”  
  
Aabha lifted her head, forcing her way through the fog of her senses. She saw the neon crimson light of the force field that had them trapped. She saw the flickering of city streets blurring past, and she saw the stars over Hypnos, distant and inscrutable.  
  
“Morgan…” she whispered. Morgan stirred at the sound of her voice, but didn’t wake.  
  
Aabha hung her head. She thought of Kit. She thought of Lily.  
  
She tried her hardest not to cry.  
  
The train shot forward on its frictionless rail, and the darkness of Trance City swallowed her up.  
  
~*~


End file.
